Trump’s ‘historic’ deal to disarm Hamas faces uphill climb

President Trump’s announcement Thursday of a “historic” deal to disarm Hamas is drawing more skepticism than fanfare. 

Hamas said it was prepared to abide by the terms, but only with the buy-in of Israel, which remains skeptical about the deal, according to a U.S official invited into the discussions. 

The agreement would see Hamas hand over weapons in phases, with Israel ultimately withdrawing its military. However, with trust between the two sides at zero, countless hurdles remain to fulfilling Trump’s vision of a demilitarized and reconstructed Gaza. 

Ghaith al-Omari, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute who’s been involved in Israel-Palestinian diplomacy since the 1990s, said the initial signals weren’t promising. 

“The formulation of this requires a lot of conditionality — if you do this, we’ll do this — and each side right now is already signaling that they’re not going to start until the other side starts,” al-Omari said. 

While Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has yet to comment on the road map, anonymous Israeli officials say there will be no withdrawal of the Israeli military from the “yellow line” established in peace talks last year unless Hamas undergoes a genuine disarmament. 

Senior Hamas official Basem Naim announced on the social platform X that Hamas “agreed to the roadmap.” But he added, “The ball is now in the enemy’s court to fulfill its obligations according to the agreement.”

“So already both sides are kind of positioning for a protracted negotiation for implementation,” al-Omari said. 

Based on Hamas’s statements so far, he said “there is nothing to indicate that they’re willing to really demilitarize,” adding, “To me, it looks more like a diplomatic maneuver.”

Michael Rubin, director of policy analysis at the Middle East Forum and a Pentagon official during former President George W. Bush’s administration, shared that skepticism.  

“The elephant in the room is always: Is Hamas sincere, or are they just trying to run down the clock on Trump?” he said. 

“Sorry to throw cold water on the optimists, but Hamas will be fighting in the streets with heavy weaponry again long before Trump gets his Nobel Peace Prize,” he added.  

Some U.S. allies expressed cautious optimism. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney called the agreement “an important step toward peace and security” if accepted and implemented. German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said the development was “hopeful,” but “real progress” must be made. 

Joel Rubin, deputy assistant secretary of State under former President Obama, argued the agreement presents a rare opportunity for progress. 

“We’re witnessing a new window opening,” he said. “As a Democrat, I’ll say this is something we should be applauding. This is something we should be supporting, cajoling, pushing forward, asking the hard questions, and getting in the game on. And not aligning with the most critical anti-peace voices that currently exist.” 

At least one Democrat in Congress, Rep. Dan Goldman (D-N.Y.), shared that enthusiasm. 

“This is a huge and outstanding development. The 20-point ceasefire agreement has been stalled by Hamas’s refusal to disarm. Now the Israeli government must do its part as Hamas demilitarizes,” he wrote on X. 

Trump claimed at his Cabinet meeting on Friday that Israel was “very happy” about the agreement, and that the U.S. has an “understanding” with Israel.  

But the reception from far-right elements of Netanyahu’s coalition was not encouraging. Israel’s national security minister, Itamar Ben Gvir, blasted the deal as “not acceptable to Israel.”  

“The targeted killings in Gaza must continue, encouraging emigration must happen, Israel must win,” the minister said in a post on X.  

Ben Gvir’s opposition points to the peril facing Netanyahu. His Likud party will need the support of Ben Gvir’s Otzma Yehudit party to remain in power following the country’s legislative elections slated for October.  

“Israeli politics is going to have to get comfortable with the idea of working [Palestinian governing] mechanisms if there’s going to be any chance of an alternative Palestinian leadership moving in,” Joel Rubin said. 

“Netanyahu is not comfortable with that, and frankly, with his election coming up, the best way for him to lose his base of right-wing support is to do that,” he added.

Anwar Mhajne, an associate professor at Stonehill College with a focus on Middle Eastern politics, said Hamas was well aware of these dynamics. 

“A more cynical interpretation is that Hamas may understand that Israel — especially with elections approaching — is unlikely to agree to the full sequencing Hamas is demanding,” she said. 

“By accepting the principle of disarmament while attaching it to conditions that Israel is unlikely to meet, Hamas can shift responsibility for the failure of negotiations onto Jerusalem. If Israel refuses to withdraw, Hamas can argue that it was Israel — not Hamas — that blocked implementation of the agreement.”

At the same time, she said Hamas was facing significant pressure on various fronts. 

“The group faces military losses, declining Iranian support, and intense pressure from regional mediators, especially Egypt and Qatar, with Turkey also playing a role. Hamas may genuinely be reassessing whether continued armed struggle is sustainable,” she said. 

Joel Rubin argued, in part, that he is optimistic about the agreement due to the involvement of those regional powers. 

“Those are the three countries that have the most influence on Hamas outside of Iran,” he said.

Michael Rubin dismissed the countries’ involvement, saying Turkey and Qatar represent “a Trojan horse.” 

“The problem with ideologues is they don’t sacrifice their ideology to make a deal the way real estate developers believe they can get to yes,” he said of Hamas, an Arabic phrase that means
“Islamic Resistance Movement.”

Nathan Brown, a political science professor at George Washington University with a focus on the Middle East, was also pessimistic that the roadmap would lead to a breakthrough in Gaza. But he said there were positive signs in the fine print. 

“Number one, the Board of Peace has been operating on the Israeli position that everything is contingent on Hamas disarming first, and they’re now converted to a position that says they both have to move reciprocally, and that’s big,” he said. 

Second, the document repeatedly refers to enforcing Palestinian law, suggesting the Board of Peace is not seeking to “rebuild governance in Gaza from the ground up, just completely ignoring past structures.”

Even if the roadmap is realized, Brown noted it does not lead to a Palestinian-led state. 

“What it looks like it leads to is an international — I shouldn’t even say an international — administration of the Gaza Strip, or parts of the Gaza Strip, by a committee headed personally and indefinitely by Donald Trump and his close associates, and doing whatever they want,” he said. “So it’s not about restoring Palestinian governance or restoring any peace process or anything like that.”

The Board of Peace, chaired by Trump in perpetuity, supervises the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza, the body envisioned to take on governance and security in the territory after Hamas disarms and Israel withdraws. 

Al-Omari, who held various positions in the Palestinian Authority, said the roadmap could put wind in the sails of Nickolay Mladenov, the director-general of the Board of Peace, a Bulgarian diplomat who was previously U.N. Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process.

“The less cynical part is, you know, when you have diplomatic process that is stuck, sometimes doing something like this will inject some energy into it,” he said, noting Egyptian and Turkish mediators would almost certainly seek to capitalize on any momentum. 

However, al-Omari noted the Trump administration had a habit of making grand announcements and failing to follow through with the focus and staffing necessary to hammer out details. 

“If you look at the region, one of the reasons that many U.S. allies don’t trust this administration is these big announcements that basically produce nothing. So this will just add to that image,” he said.